


Various Storms and Saints

by helpme_iminlove



Series: Kastle Week [4]
Category: Daredevil (TV)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Kastle Week, Post-Season/Series 02
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-12
Updated: 2016-05-12
Packaged: 2018-06-08 01:19:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,384
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6833026
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/helpme_iminlove/pseuds/helpme_iminlove
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kastle Week Day #5 - Storm</p><p>“You don’t mind the rain?” he asked, and Karen was reminded of that night with Matt all those months ago. Do you mind the rain?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Various Storms and Saints

**Author's Note:**

> Day #5!  
> Out of every prompt this week, this one was the hardest, honestly. Because I had the idea to make a scene that sort of juxtaposed against Matt and Karen's kiss in the rain, but these darn characters just wouldn't let that happen easily. They gotta work out all their crap before any kissing can happen, and that's pretty annoying tbh. It's probably not realistic, but I like it anyways, I think it's kind of romantic in a way. But anyways, I hope you like this!  
> So let me know what you think in the comments or with a kudos!  
> Go check out all the other Kastle Week stuff on my tumblr at https://www.tumblr.com/blog/almost-tooktheshot!

After no contact from him for months, the dead man appeared in her apartment.

    Karen had been doing just fine after Nelson and Murdock had fallen apart, and her new job at The Bulletin was treating her well. She had made new friends and was even planning to move to a new apartment soon. Everything was new for her, and she felt a strange rebirth, one that she hoped would help her finally move away from the darkness of her past.

Of course, all the good things in life had to come to a stuttering halt as soon as Frank Castle decided to reinsert himself in her life.

She drew her gun from her purse the second she noticed her door was open. She held the gun in front of her as she pushed the door open quietly, and she saw him standing there in the middle of her living room, his hands already raised in some kind of strange parallel to what had taken place months before, before he saved her life.

“Frank?” She asked into the dark room. “What the hell-”

“Your apartment isn't safe right now, I came to get you,” he said, his hands still raised. Karen blinked when she realized she still had the weapon aimed at his chest. He lowered his arms when she lowered her gun.

“Why isn't it safe? What is going on-”

“Now’s not the time, ma'am,” he said, and suddenly he was across the room and taking her gun from her as he led them back out the door urgently. Karen followed his lead and stopped asking questions, because if she was in enough danger for Frank Castle to be concerned enough to think she couldn't handle herself, it must be pretty damn serious. They hurried down the steps of her building and he handed the gun back to her. She put it back in her purse just before they got out into the street. Frank pulled his baseball cap lower so as to hide his surprisingly unbruised face, and although it was nearly eleven o'clock, a vigilante can't be too careful.

“Do you know of any place that's safe and crowded?” He asked as they headed down the street, and Karen was skeptical.

“You're not using me as bait again are you?” The words come out as venom, making it clear to Frank that he can't just show up and expect everything to be okay. He gets what she means and laughs darkly.

“No,” is all he says and she huffs.

“Um, yeah, we can go to Josie's,” she says, directing him to turn down another street. They were walking in that direction already, but truthfully Karen had been waiting for an excuse to revisit the rundown bar. She wrapped her coat around her more tightly, looking up at the dark clouds overhead. It looked like it was going to rain.

It had barely begun to sprinkle when they arrived at the bar, Frank holding the door open for her as they escaped the drizzle of rain. They sat in the darkest booth they could find, regardless of the fact that the sheer amount of people that had shown up on that particular Friday would be protection enough. It was one of those small rounded booths, and Karen found herself sliding in to sit right next to Frank instead of across from him. In her defense, she felt safer the closer she was to him.

But she was actually sitting really close. Too close to be sitting next to someone you hadn't seen for months, never mind the fact that that person was The Punisher. An awkward silence settled over them as Frank must've realized this as well. But Karen couldn't just scoot over; that would be calling attention to their vicinity and would only serve to make the situation more awkward. The evening had quickly gone from escaping danger to some kind of awkward date. Karen had to shake the thought away. Frank had done too much for her to be thinking that way, for her to basically forgive him like that. She scooted out of the booth, “I'll go get us some drinks.”

He hummed in agreement as he continued to scan the room, his trigger finger moving restlessly against his clasped hands. Karen let out a shaky breath as she moved away from the table, worming her way through the crowd to get to the bar. She had to squeeze through some people to get to the bar, but Josie saw her right away.

“What the hell are you doing here Blondie?” the gruff woman asked as she got Karen’s usual beer. Karen smiled, “I was just around and thought I’d have a drink. Two beers, actually.”

Josie raised an eyebrow, but slid the drinks to Karen anyways.

“Thanks,” Karen said as she grabbed the drinks and turned away from the counter, and Josie just waved a dismissive hand over her shoulder, “Yeah, yeah.”

Karen took another deep breath as she approached the booth once again, trying to regain her cold exterior. She could not let her guard down, or else who knew what would happen. A big part of her wanted to trust Frank; he had saved her life twice, and so obviously she felt safe with him. But each time he had always turned around and hurt her, slamming the door in her face. How can you fully trust someone who protected you and then told you to stay away? Their relationship was unclear to her, and she truthfully had so many things that she wanted to say to him, things that had been brewing over the last few months since she had seen him on that rooftop. The bitterness in her said that she shouldn’t give him even the chance to explain himself, but the person that had been defending him for so long said otherwise.

She was just so confused, and she took a hard swallow of the beer that tasted like piss before she slid into the booth, farther away from Frank this time. She put his drink in front of him, and he glanced at it and nodded, returning to looking around the room. Karen rolled her eyes and took another drink. Getting drunk actually sounded like a really good idea.

A few moments passed before Frank turned his head towards her and said, “So, how’s the lawyer.”

Because _of course_ he would make Karen’s lovely evening even better by asking about Matt Murdock.

“I’m sure he’s fine,” Karen said a little bitterly, picking at the damp label on the drink in front of her.

Frank raised an eyebrow, “You don’t know?”

Karen made a strange huff that could’ve been a laugh, “We aren’t exactly on speaking terms.”

Pause. “What happened to what I said?” he asked.

Oh yes. The Great Love Speech. Karen felt the anger resurface.

“Look, Frank, you don’t always know everything, alright?” Karen burst, looking him dead in the eye for once. Her hand tightened around her beer and his finger stopped tapping.

Karen found herself continuing, “Maybe I did love Matt, maybe you were right about that, but you can’t exactly hold onto something that is determined on slipping out of your grasp, okay? You can’t continue to love somebody when they hurt you in a way that you can’t come back from.”

Frank was staring at her in that strange way he had when she told him he was gonna rot in his “goddamn jail cell.” Admiration, maybe? Understanding? She wasn’t sure, but this wasn’t the first time he had set this gaze upon her, and it wasn’t the first time that that same gaze had sparked something deep in her chest, sparking a small flame beneath her lungs, making it hard to breathe. _Dammit, Karen_ , she thought, and forced herself to look away first.

More awkward moments passed as Karen refused to look at Frank, sipping on her beer as Frank did the same. The crowd in the bar was loud, cheering at the UFC fight on the small television screen in one corner while others were talking loudly over games of pool. Karen sighed, remembering the easy days when it was just her and Foggy and Matt, playing pool every Thursday and laughing like nothing was wrong, like Matt _wasn’t_ The Devil of Hell’s Kitchen. She felt a painful lurch in her stomach and set her beer back on the table a little more forcefully than she had intended. Frank looked up at her in surprise and she ran her hands through her hair, clutching the blonde strands in frustration. _Just_ when she thought she was getting better.

“Can we go yet?” she asked, wanting to get away from the bad memories, and Frank especially.

He just nodded and mumbled, “Yeah, let’s go.”

They went out of the booth at opposite ends, and Frank stood behind Karen as they walked out of the bar, a hand hovering over her back. He tried to rest his hand on her hip to respectfully guide her out, but she tensed up the moment his fingers brushed her side. He dropped his hand as they stepped out the door.

It was pouring rain. And Karen sighed in frustration, “I’ll just get a cab.”

“No,” Frank said, and she was about to protest when he said, “It’s not safe.”

She supposed he was right. “Are you going to walk me home, then?”

In another world, those words may have been filled with some kind of other intent. In another world, Karen would say them as an invitation to the man beside her. In another world she would grab his hand and lead him home. But in this world, at this moment, the words were just a simple question.

Frank nodded. “You don’t mind the rain?” he asked, and Karen was reminded of that night with Matt all those months ago. _Do you mind the rain?_

“No,” she said and began to walk back home, Frank following behind at her heels. She shivered and wrapped her coat around her tightly, hunching her shoulders against the downpour. They walked in silence, cars passing by, the rain soaking them to the bone. They reached her apartment building and Frank grabbed Karen’s elbow to indicate that she should follow behind him, in case of any danger. He walked her up to the apartment, going into the room first to see if everything was okay. He nodded that the room was clear, and she went inside, closing the door behind her.

She leaned against the door, watching Frank in the dark apartment as he stood in the center of the room, glancing around, moving restlessly, shifting from foot to foot as if he was unsure of what to say. Karen felt her resolve begin to crumble. Being angry was so tiring.

“Do you want coffee?” she asked softly, moving past him to her small kitchen to start a pot.

She heard him breathe out, almost in relief. “Yeah, coffee would be good. Thanks.”

She flicked on the light, and she squinted against the brightness. She almost wanted to turn the light back off, just because of the strange comfort that came from the darkness, the rain pouring outside her windows.

She started the pot of coffee and then brushed past him to her room, taking off her coat and heels finally. Her blouse and skirt were also soaking wet, but some part of her was enjoying the feeling, so she opted to change out of them when Frank left. She turned back around to see that he was close behind her, a strange look on his face, ballcap in his hands. He wasn’t looking at her though, looking at some point on the floor just past her, his brow furrowed.

“Frank?” she asked, wondering at the sudden change in his demeanor. She almost gasped at how close he was standing, that small spark starting up beneath her lungs again.

“Ma’am, I-” he started. He seemed to be struggling for the words. _That’s a first_ , Karen thought.

“I just wanted to say,” he said, and his tone was a mirror to the bruised man that had lain in a hospital bed and thanked her for helping him remember.

“I just wanted to say that I think you’ve done a lot for me, more than I give you credit for. Hell, if I know why, but you have helped me a lot,” he said quietly, and Karen felt her resolve crumble even more.

“So it wasn’t fair of me to leave you the way I did,” he finally looked at her, and Karen saw an intensity there that she had never seen before.

Karen found herself speaking before she could stop herself, “Well, I was the one who said you were dead to me.”

“And I should be,” he said lowly, the smallest bit of anger creeping into his voice, before it was gone, vanished.

“But,” and his brow furrowed again, as if he was confused by the things he was saying, “but I read your articles, and they’re damn good. And I- I, well, I like to keep an eye on you to make sure you’re okay, and I can’t seem to- I can’t seem to-”

“Forget,” Karen breathed, suddenly understanding what it was that he was trying to say. He looked at her then, a small smirk playing on his lips, “Yeah. Believe me, I’ve tried. But I can’t--”

Karen don’t know what made her do it. She thought she was angry, she thought she would hate him. But she found herself pulling his face towards hers then, suddenly, softly, and she kissed him.

He jerked away in shock, then confusion, because of course he would think that he wasn’t worthy of her. He asked her so many questions just with his eyes as they looked at each other, Karen’s hands still on his face, his hands finding themselves holding her hands there by her wrists, and they breathed softly into the space between them as the rain continued to pour outside.

Karen spoke again before she could stop herself, and the words came out as a whisper. “I forgive you Frank. For all of it.”

And then he kissed her.

And the storm raged on.


End file.
